An inspection of the Future Border and Immigration System benefits realisation (March – July 2026)

It is recommended that as the Future Borders and Immigration System (FBIS) programme closes, a lessons learnt exercise identifies the many elements of good practice that have underpinned its success to date, and that these be embodied within Home Office assurance methodologies to provide a template of best practice and to test transferability into other projects and programmes.

Home Office accepted: The Home Office welcomes this recommendation and recognises the importance of capturing the good practice developed through the Future Borders and Immigration System (FBIS) programme so it can inform future projects and programmes. Work is already well advanced. FBIS remains the largest programme contributor to the Home Office Lessons Learned repository, and a deep dive into more than 360 lessons has been completed to identify transferable good practice and strengthen assurance approaches. Learning has also been shared through Home Office and international engagement, demonstrating how FBIS practice in governance, risk-based decision-making, compliance maturity, strategic oversight and operational resilience can support other complex transformation environments. As FBIS moves through transition and closure, planned lessons learned activity will capture system-level knowledge, preserve key delivery insights and ensure that the Programme leaves a practical legacy of knowledge sharing across the Home Office.

Implementation: January 2027

It is recommended that before FBIS closes, work is undertaken to identify exactly who will be responsible for any ongoing delivery of all benefits including those that have/are being delivered, and those yet to come to fruition.

Home Office accepted: The Home Office accepts this recommendation and agrees with the importance of ensuring clear roles and responsibilities for the monitoring and realisation of benefits delivered by the Future Borders and Immigration System (FBIS) programme. Each benefit being delivered by the FBIS programme has a defined owner in place. Owners were agreed during the identification of the benefits. Typically, benefit owners work within the area of the department most directly impacted by the delivery the benefit. As part of the programme’s transition and closure arrangements, we will organise formal handovers with benefit owners to ensure that they are clear on their responsibilities to continue to monitor and measure the realisation of benefits delivered by the FBIS programme. We will also work with portfolio teams within the Home Office to agree benefit reporting processes following Programme closure.

Implementation: January 2027

It is recommended that the work and momentum of the Border Transformation team be significantly enhanced with resources and support to enable it to take on oversight of delivery of all aspects of transforming the border in ways that fully utilise the potential of the capabilities FBIS has produced, and delivers the efficiency benefits at the border in conjunction with Spending Review requirements, across all ports. It is for consideration that this is best achieved by adopting a portfolio approach with the current team migrating to a Border Transformation Task Force, led by and involving operations staff at all levels.

Home Office accepted: The Home Office will build on the momentum established by the Passenger Transformation Delivery Team as FBIS capabilities are embedded and the wider transformation agenda progresses across the organisation. As the FBIS programme concludes, existing structures and delivery arrangements will be reviewed to ensure they are aligned to deliver transformation effectively over the coming years. This will include the consideration of the resource and support required and how oversight of all border transformation activity and benefits realisation across ports will be managed. The future structure, including whether to adopt a portfolio approach, will be determined by March 2027.

Implementation: March 2027